Supervisor Bevan Dufty speaks during the San Francisco Board of Supervisors meeting at City Hall in San Francisco, Calif. on Tuesday May 3, 2010.
Ran on: 10-02-2010
Mayoral hopeful Bevan Dufty
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Photo: Lea Suzuki, The Chronicle

S.F. repeat offenders, citations target of plan

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The quality of life on San Francisco's streets might finally start to improve.

After decades of confusion and dysfunction, the city's police, sheriff, district attorney, courts and mayor's office are crafting a plan to track, prosecute and get services for the persistent offenders who rack up dozens of citations and blithely ignore them.

It's about time.

For the past six months, this column has focused on how a small group of bad actors - primarily chronic inebriates - drain city resources, distract law enforcement officials and frustrate residents who can't understand why someone can be cited repeatedly for the same offense but never seem to face any consequences nor get the help they need. A working group was formed to improve how these citations are handled, and a city controller's report released Tuesday should provide the framework needed to make for real change.

"This has been an urban legend for 20 years," said Supervisor Bevan Dufty, who commissioned a report on citations from the controller's office after reading about the problems highlighted in The Chronicle. "There is no reason why we can't correct this byzantine, dysfunctional, outmoded method of handling citations."

'Shuffling paper'

The controller's report reinforced what critics have been saying for the past six months. It found that almost half of all quality of life citations are dismissed in traffic court - three times the rate of other citations.

"What we've been doing is shuffling paper," said Cristine DeBerry, the mayor's deputy chief of staff, who is part of the working group. "We're spending an inordinate amount of money issuing citations and nothing happens. We need to either stop writing them, or mean it when we do."

There isn't any question what the majority of San Franciscans would choose. The city's urine-soaked streets, aggressive panhandlers and sidewalk campers have appalled tourists and neighborhood residents for years.

The worst of the worst

But the real key is that a relatively small number of chronic offenders - DeBerry thinks it may be as few as 50 to 100 - are generating a disproportionate number of citations. Those chronic offenders - and they are almost all male - are neither getting the treatment they need nor the nudge from law enforcement to stop breaking the law.

Police, prosecutors and courts are now targeting chronic offenders with 20 or more court warrants.

"These guys fall through the cracks," said Capt. Joe Garrity of the Tenderloin Station. "Everybody knows they need to get into services, but cops feel like they are spinning their wheels."

A new database is being created to allow officers and prosecutors to view a person's complete criminal history. This will help police and prosecutors identify people with multiple warrants.

The Sheriff's Department has also agreed to hold people with 20 or more warrants. Typically when someone with an outstanding warrant is brought to the jail, he is given a citation and notice to appear in court and sent on his way.

No one expects to lock up these defendants and throw away the key. Almost all of them have addiction or mental health problems. The idea is to get them into a program like the Community Justice Center.

Cases there are typically handled in a matter of days, compared with the 291 days it could take to get to trial in traffic court. The judge typically orders services that try to get to the root of the problem instead of simply sending someone to jail or prison.

A CJC model could also address another problem endemic to the current process. Defendants often have their infractions dismissed in traffic court when they produce a letter from a service provider stating that they are participating in an accepted plan. But, as the controller's report says, there is no follow-up to verify that the letters are valid or that the defendants complete the services.

At the Community Justice Center, the judge holds defendants accountable. In many cases, there is a follow-up appearance that serves as an incentive to accept services and encouragement for sticking with the program. A win-win.

"There is no reason that we can't do something that is both humane and financially responsible," Dufty said.

Room for improvement

Targeting the highest offenders it a good start, but the controller's report found plenty of room for improvement. The report found:

-- The Police Department and traffic court cannot access each other's databases. An officer in the field might be writing a citation for someone who has a long list of previous citations for the same offense.

A centralized, automated system is needed that can be accessed by everyone, including officers on the street. If he was able to access it, DeBerry said, "The officer could say this person has 37 warrants for the exact same thing I am writing a ticket for now."

-- The Traffic Court Response form, which was supposed to reduce the time police officers spend in court by substituting a written report for a personal appearance, actually forces officers to spend an enormous amount of time on a report that is used inconsistently in court.

Data entry

-- The method of entering data for citations is both inconsistent and badly outdated, leading to "human and divisionwide errors, potentially including lost tickets and delays." The controller's report found that in 2009, police reported 129,816 citations and the court reported 151,697. Nearly 22,000 citations simply disappeared.

Each station has its own method of delivering citations to court and compiling citation counts. The controller's report says the methods range from "a typewriter, a computer, or hand-writing tick-marks" - and an invitation to confusion.

The Police Department needs to come up with a systematic way to write and deliver the reports.

While this is only a beginning, it is an impressive start on a vexing problem that has plagued this great city for decades.